HE might be married to the woman whose erotic novel has smashed all the bestseller records, but Niall Leonard wants to get one thing straight: He’s not the real life Christian Grey.

It is the book that has taken the literary world by storm and most of Britain’s women as well. So it is understandable that the husband of 50 Shades of Grey author EL James is getting used to difficult questions.

But Niall Leonard isn’t just ‘him indoors’ to the woman behind the erotic novel of the decade – he is an accomplished writer who has moved his art from the beauty of the Scottish Highlands to the suburban streets of London.

The 53-year-old has gone from writing scripts for Monarch of the Glen to a hard edged young adult thriller set in the Big Smoke.

But do people see him differently after his wife’s books and the famous, fictional, Christian Grey?

“People don’t,” he insisted.

“Very few ask me intrusive questions. People think this is a fantasy written by a woman having a daydream and sharing it.

While his wife was dreaming this up, Niall was switching from a successful TV career to the world of fictional novels.

He said: “It’s like coming home and achieving what I wanted to do as a kid. I wanted to write books and then I moved into TV.”

That led to Niall being a creative force on Hornblower, Wire in the Blood and Monarch of the Glen.

He said: “With Hornblower, I came to the show late. The producers asked if I’d read the books and I looked them up and I’d read them all.

“Wire in the Blood was my favourite show. They had some great writers and the directors weren’t allowed to change the scripts so it was a great show to work on.

“Monarch of the Glen was wonderful. It was interesting to see how it evolved. It came to a natural end. I think shows should be allowed to grow old then pass away.

“Shows are kept going after their lifespan and that doesn’t work.”

Niall and 50 Shades creator EL James

While a career as a wordsmith is unstable, it allowed him to be a hands-on dad as he and wife – real name Erica – raised their sons, now 15 and 17, in West London.

“In TV a job comes to an end and there’s that scary moment when you wonder where the next job is coming from,” he said. “You don’t have a predictable lifestyle so it can be nerve-wracking. But the rewards are great so it’s worth it.”

But novel writing was like an itch demanding to be scratched. It was Erica who encouraged Niall to participate in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), a challenge to write a 50,000 word novel in November.

Niall said: “I came across the NaNoWriMo website and my wife said, ‘Why don’t you do it?’ I had a few half–finished novels lying around so I revisited them.

“I was having a conversation with a friend who was moaning her boys were teenagers who never read.

“She said, ‘They’re not into vampire dystopia, they’re not into sci-fi, they don’t like horror and everything in book shops is one of those.’ I thought, what you want is a 17-year-old detective, set it in London and make it really gritty.”

Crusher was released in September, and is the story of Finn Maguire, “an illiterate drop-out with no GCSEs, stuck in a dead end job.” Finn comes home to find his father beaten to death. He is the prime suspect, so the grieving process must wait as his search for answers takes him to some dark places.

Niall said: “I treated it like Wire in the Blood. I didn’t pull any punches. I didn’t skirt around the sex and violence. I just told the story.”

Leonard’s two sons fall into Crusher’s target demographic.

“My older son is reading it and is enjoying it. The younger one came down for dinner and I told him he wasn’t eating unless he read the book, so he’s gone off with a copy.”

As Niall prepares to hit the road to promote Crusher, early reviews have been excellent.

“I think the real test is still to come as I meet readers in person,” he said. “I’m slightly nervous. I always say I write for myself, but I want other people to like it. I defy any artist to be neutral to reviews.”

What next for the man who has ticked off another ambition? Surely the success of his wife will affect the family’s lifestyle? “Nothing’s changed. I’m still looking at a really tatty garden. The kids are still going to school, the dog still needs to be walked. When her books took off I thought, I’m just going to spend the rest of my career carrying her bags to the airport,” he joked. “And then Crusher came along.

“My aspiration is to write a second that works. You get an instant connection you don’t get in TV. It’s an amazing buzz and I’d be thrilled to write novels for the rest of my life.”

If the early success of Crusher is any indication, that childhood dream has led to a new reality.

The adventures of the Glen are the past, the future is on those crime-ridden streets of London and the present. Time to write book two and get someone in to sort out that garden.